THE microphone does not fall that far from the tree. Frank and Kathie Lee Gifford’s son, Cody, and Paula Zahn’s daughter, Haley Cohen, have been hired to anchor a new syndicated show called “Kids News.”

On the half-hour, weekly show, Cohen, 14, anchors – just like her mom does on CNN – and Gifford, 13, covers sports, just like his dad did on “Eyewitness News” in the 1970s.

“At first Cody didn’t want to do it,” says Frank Gifford. “[But] we went down to a run-through and he gave it a thumbs up.”

Still, more pressing ambitions may ultimately force Cody to quit, his dad says.

“I don’t know what’s going to happen when baseball season comes around though,” says Frank. “I’m gonna leave it up to him. But I think if it interferes with baseball on Saturdays. . . he’s a pretty good catcher – well, we’ll see what happens.”

“I started thinking about putting together this [broadcast] after the Columbine shooting,” says Albert T. Primo, a legend in the TV news business for creating the “Eyewitness News” format in the late 1960s.

“All you saw at Columbine were adults, the police officials, the school officials, no one was talking to the kids,” he says. “Then the [Beltway] sniper happened and they were pulling the kids out of the schools, but no one was talking to them,” says Primo. “These kids are smart as hell and nobody was talking to them.”

A recent “Kids News” telecast featured coverage of the Democratic candidates’ debate in New York, while another dealt with bullies – who they are and what can be done about them.

“Kids News” began airing in September on 173 stations around the country. In New York, it airs Saturdays at 7 a.m. on Long Island’s Ch. 55.

Primo found most of his on-air staff – including Cohen’s co-news anchor Mwanzaa Brown, 13, who used to star as Young Simba in “The Lion King” on Broadway – through an open casting call.